Your Personal Role in Releasing God's Glory by Amber Picota

Through a couple different supernatural encounters, God spoke something utterly profound to me about His Glory, and what our role is in releasing Glory in the Earth through our everyday lives. I want to share with you what God revealed to me through these experiences. It is my hope that we can advance the Kingdom of God together, in our separate lives, and have great impact for God in the Earth. Several months ago, I had a dream. In this dream, Jesus positioned my arms as if I was carrying something. With His finger he wrote on my right forearm the word "glory." The words appeared as a rainbow on my arm.

Through a couple different supernatural encounters, God spoke something utterly profound to me about His Glory, and what our role is in releasing Glory in the Earth through our everyday lives. I want to share with you what God revealed to me through these experiences. It is my hope that we can advance the Kingdom of God together, in our separate lives, and have great impact for God in the Earth.

Several months ago, I had a dream. In this dream, Jesus positioned my arms as if I was carrying something. With His finger he wrote on my right forearm the word "glory." The words appeared as a rainbow on my arm.

What Holy Spirit told me is that God was about to teach me about how to be a carrier of His Glory. Woah.

I was absolutely wrecked for like the entire day.

Several days later, one morning I was working, doing my usual thing, except I just could not get my mind on my work. I was tearing up, and just very moved, to the point of tears. It wasn't like I was sad necessarily, but I just could not snap out of it to get any work done. I put on some worship music that normally energizes me, but within minutes the floodgate was open and I had tears flowing down my cheeks.

At this point I turned the worship music off, sobbing, moved by the Holy Spirit, I stood up and walked from the love seat to the couch and sat down. "Ok God. What is it?" I said.

Next I had an open vision of Jesus in my living room. It was His image in front of me sort of like a projector. As the seconds passed, He became clearer. Jesus said to me, "There's been a horrible case of identity theft"

Now I don't know about y'all but I over analyze things a lot and I'm always trying to jump ahead of any teacher, even in the natural so in my thoughts, in response to what Jesus just said, "There's been a horrible case of identity theft," the wheels in my head immediately started spinning. "Yeah, Jesus, You're so right," I thought… "What the Church needs today is some good teaching on identity. They need to know who they are, and what authority they walk in."

"SHHHHH…." He said, "That's not what I'm talking about. Just Listen."

Oh. Ok.

Jesus goes on to say, "The identity that has been hijacked is MINE"

"Yours?" I thought, processing it all.

"Yes. Mine."

You see, the thing that God revealed to me, here in the living room, face to face with Jesus, is that much of the Body of Christ have presented a FALSE identity of who God is, to the world. The way many of us explain God, or represent God, is not true to His character.

God was showing me this: IF YOU'VE SEEN JESUS, YOU'VE SEEN ME.

This is confirmed in when Jesus said, "If you've seen me you've seen the Father" (I looked this up later, it's John 14:9. Fancy that)

In other words, God is like Jesus. If you've seen Jesus, you've seen God. Jesus is the perfect representation of God.

Back Into My Living Room

At some point I'm so overwhelmed with hurt. I feel like I could feel a measure of the rejection felt by the people who have been cast out and pushed out of the local churches (little c) because of Christians who misrepresented the heart of the Father. I'm sobbing.

Jesus reaches down to me, and puts two fingers under my chin and lifts my face up to connect with His, forehead to forehead, nose to nose, and I can see into His eyes. There was fire in His eyes, and what He showed me is that the fire that burns in His eyes are the irrational, incomprehensible, overwhelming fires of His love…. And as I looked a little deeper inside His eyes, I could see the wounded ones, the rejected ones, the ones who feel like outcasts because they're not "churchy" enough, or they are not "clean" enough for church.

In this moment I could feel this raw surge of passion, pierce me completely.

And from that moment on, if I think about it fully and let myself get lost in the moment, I can feel it all again just like it just happened.

I was wrecked for the whole day, the whole rest of the week. I had even texted a few people to explain these amazing experiences I was having with Jesus in my dreams and in my living room.

I didn't exactly know how these two experiences were connected, but I knew they were, and that God would connect the dots for me eventually. All I knew is my heart was on fire, and I was forever changed because there was no way to unsee what I had seen. I knew he was about to teach me about the Glory, and that I was supposed to pass on with others what I learned.

Stay tuned here because I'm about to explain how God connected the dots for me.

Glory School

That Sunday at church, we had Lynn Hiles come and teach. For those of y'all who missed it, your homework is to watch the video.

Worship was ridiculous that morning. I was completely ravished by God's love that morning.

Lynn gets up to preach, and the first thing He says is "I'm going to teach on the Glory this morning."

Pretty sure I literally yelled, "WHAT?!!" As I began to tremble. Because, HELLO, God just said He was going to teach me about the Glory. Granted I had already read every Ruth Ward Heflin book on the Glory, and also read David Herzog's book, "Glory Zone." But I knew deep down inside me that God was about to fill in the gap for me and take me to school on the Glory in a way like never before.

To say I took notes would be an understatement. I'm pretty sure I ripped my bag open, flinging objects in search of a pen and notebook.

Nothing was going to stop me from taking notes and absorbing everything Lynn said because I just KNEW God had something for me. And He did!

Ok so I'm going to quickly summarize for you what Lynn shared so that I can communicate what dots that God connected for me in understanding how these two separate encounters actually tied together.

As Lynn was preaching, I think I hollered "WOW" a minimum of 4 times.

Lynn shares that when reading the story of Moses (Exodus 33:17-23), he actually remembers feeling a little disappointed. And the reason being, Moses asks God for one thing: "Show me your Glory," but instead God says that no-one can look upon His face and live. Instead, He shows Moses His backside.

Quick Bunny Trail

One Wednesday night back when we were youth pastors, Rene gets up and says, "The title of my sermon tonight is 'When God Mooned Moses'….." because he is preaching on this passage of scripture. That was not a wife approved sermon title, but now it's a little fun to laugh at. The teens got a laugh at that and learned a lot.

Back to Lynn's Sermon Though

Lynn explains that later one day he is reading in Matthew, specifically chapter 17, verses 1-8, and it all clicks for him. In this passage, Jesus visits with Moses and Elijah face to face on the mountain and we see there that to see Jesus face to face is to see the glory of God. Back in Exodus God says no one can see His face, then Jesus comes and says He is god in the flesh, and Peter, James and John witness Jesus speaking to Moses and Elijah face to face.

God did show Moses His Glory, just not the way Moses probably thought He would.

While Lynn was preaching, I was trembling. It becomes very surreal to me that Jesus came to show me His glory. Face to face. Eyeball to eyeball. Nose to nose. Glawwwry! I'm STILL wound up about it.

But the reason I share all of this with you today is for a very important reason. You see, God went on to share much more with me about His Glory.

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. Romans 8:18-21

What I'm sharing with you here is like a tiny minuscule fragment about God's Glory. All I know is a small tiny bit. It's a lot to me, but in the big picture, it's microscopic. It's valuable and beautiful….but there's so much more.

You are a carrier of God's glory. He designed you, inside and out, to be a vessel. There is a measure of God's Glory that has become your responsibility to release on the earth. You don't release it all at once. You do it every time you flow in what God called you to do. Every time you advance the Kingdom. Every single time you do God's work, whether you're raising the dead or hugging a sad child.

The Work of God is Often in Mundane Tasks

You have a personal role in releasing God's glory in your life. The Kingdom of Heaven is within you. You have access to heavenly blessings and power here on earth.

Now I want to wrap all of this up by explaining a little metaphor that God used to kind of illustrate this whole scenario for me. I will pass it on to you.

You know the fire hydrants that are on the corner of some streets? If ever there were a fire, the fire department comes and hooks their hose to this hydrant and they crank open the valve to release the water through the hose. You are the fire hose. The hose is God's glory. And the act of turning that lever that releases the water is actually YOUR Spirit Led good works.

Examples

God leads you to pray for the cashier at the grocery store, you dream of a friend so you call her the next day to check on her and give her a word of encouragement, you bring your neighbor soup because they're sick, you step out in faith and give a prophetic word to someone…. These are Spirit Led good works.

You're not SAVED by these works, but they crank open the valve for God's glory to flow through you.

Remember my little metaphor. You're the fire hose, and the water is God's glory.

What God showed me is that many people have kinks in their hose because they do not allow themselves to be authentic. What God showed me is that each of us have a purpose on earth, and He longs to release His glory through each of us, however when we are trying to pretend to be more like that person or this person, we limit the flow of what He wants to do through us.

Think about it. I'm sure every single one of us in this room has at some point tried to be different.

Every single one of us has probably thought that we'd rather be more extroverted like so and so, so we try to kind of fake it till we make it…or maybe we copied the mannerisms of a minister….tried to dress like someone else…tried to talk like someone else… Oh here's a good one, and this is one I was actually guilty of. I used to read other bloggers and listen to comedians and when I saw how funny they were and how much they made me laugh, I came to the conclusion that I wish I were more like them so I could make people laugh also.

But the truth was that I was much funnier when I just stuck to MY humor. The truth is you're much cooler and much more attractive when you wear the styles YOU feel confident in. You're much more confident praying for others when you pray the words God is bubbling up in YOUR spirit.

You're the only you that God ever created.

The Move You Can Fulfill

There is a move of God in the earth that only YOU can fulfill.

Creation is groaning in anticipation of you releasing all that Glory that God packed on the inside of you.

Your likes and dislikes, your personality, your sense of humor, your quirks, your interests…These things are part of who God created you to be. They're your FLAVOR, your brand… These things make you YOU. Keep being you. Be authentic. Like the things you like. Be who you are and don't change just to please people.

You could adjust who you are to please people, but there will still be people who don't like you. You're better off being your true self, even if that means some people don't like you. In the end, the right people will be attracted to you and you can release what God placed you on the Earth to release, in a way that only YOU can do it.

Things are shaking in the world today, and that which is built upon deception, lies, hate, and perversion is coming down. I want to preface by stating that this is not meant to be a spooky, weird, or scary prophetic word, even though I normally don't prophesy like this. Make sure and read to the end because God is good, and this shaking is good for us, good for the world, and good for the Body of Christ. There is a lot of shaking taking place in the world today. Not a physical shaking but a spiritual one.

Many years ago, before I even had a relationship with God, my aunt said to me that I would one day be a trailblazer and that I would do great things for God. She had no grounds for that word of prophecy, based on what she could see with her physical eyes. In the natural, I was on a slippery slope of destructive behavior. Tangled up in addiction, drugs, and promiscuity, there was no indicator (in the natural) that I would ever be able to get free and fulfill that thing she had spoken over me.

Recently after many years without seeing an optometrist, I went in for an eye exam. Let's be honest. I'm not an appointment making type of lady, and I'm also not a "go to the doctor of any kind" type of lady, so when I say I went in for an eye exam, what I'm actually saying is my dear husband made an appointment and kindly reminded me repeatedly until I went to said appointment.